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<h1><a href="https://archiveofourown.org/works/26933980">Flatline</a> by <a class='authorlink' href='https://archiveofourown.org/users/somelittlevaudeville/pseuds/somelittlevaudeville'>somelittlevaudeville</a></h1>

<table class="full">

<tr><td><b>Category:</b></td><td>Newsies - All Media Types, Newsies!: the Musical - Fierstein/Menken</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Genre:</b></td><td>Additional Warnings In Author's Note, Alcohol, Car Accidents, Character Death, M/M, Major Character Injury</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Language:</b></td><td>English</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Status:</b></td><td>Completed</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Published:</b></td><td>2020-10-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Updated:</b></td><td>2020-10-10</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Packaged:</b></td><td>2021-05-06 16:09:47</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Rating:</b></td><td>Teen And Up Audiences</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Warnings:</b></td><td>Major Character Death</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Chapters:</b></td><td>1</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Words:</b></td><td>580</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Publisher:</b></td><td>archiveofourown.org</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Story URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/works/26933980</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Author URL:</b></td><td>https://archiveofourown.org/users/somelittlevaudeville/pseuds/somelittlevaudeville</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Summary:</b></td><td><div class="userstuff">
              <p>When Jack gets sick and Race acts stupid the whole world comes tumbling down.</p>
            </div></td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Relationships:</b></td><td>Crutchie &amp; David Jacobs, Crutchie &amp; Jack Kelly, Crutchie &amp; Racetrack Higgins, David Jacobs &amp; Jack Kelly, Implied David Jacobs/Jack Kelly, Racetrack Higgins &amp; David Jacobs</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Comments:</b></td><td>2</td></tr>

<tr><td><b>Kudos:</b></td><td>19</td></tr>

</table>

<a name="section0001"><h2>Flatline</h2></a>
<div class="story"><div class="fff_chapter_notes fff_head_notes"><b>Author's Note:</b><blockquote class="userstuff">
      <p>TW for death, alcohol, and suicidal ideation</p>
    </blockquote></div><div class="userstuff module">
    
    <p>Race remembered it like it was yesterday. Race remembered Crutchie's sob, Davey's retreating steps, the nurses prying him off of the body. The nurses dragging it away in one last attempt to save him. It didn't work. He was still dead.</p><p>Davey left without a word. He didn't come to the funeral and while Race and Crutchie stayed at the hospital he packed up his things from their apartment and left.</p><p>They tried calling him- he didn't answer. They tried to find some sort of sign that he might come back. But the heartbroken 19 &amp; 16 year old were left alone.</p><p>After waiting so long in the hospital for the inevitable and eventual stop of his brother's heartbeat, Race knew what the noise was. He knew there was a heart monitor and he could hear the eerily familiar noise of shoes on the tile floor and blinding white light of the hospital. But it hurt.</p><p>Everything hurt since he had been stupid enough to go in a car drunk. He could hear sniffles coming from his right and knew they were Crutchie's, having memorised them from when their other brother was dying himself. Race knew he was dying but when trying to reach out and say goodbye to Crutchie, he found himself too weak.</p><p>All he could remember was the hazy and light feeling in his head. The loud blasts of the party's music. His friend's enthusiastic chatter. The burning of the alcohol as it slid down his throat. The empty feeling that he enjoyed. He was able to forget for a while.</p><p>He ignored the feeling in his gut when his friends said they should go for a ride. "Why not?" he thought. "We drive around all the time."</p><p>He ignored the feeling when his friends said they should cross the Brooklyn Bridge and ride in the bed of the truck.</p><p>He didn't say, "We can't drive, we're drunk."</p><p>He didn't say, "Riding in the bed isn't safe."</p><p>He didn't say no when they asked him to stand up and dance with him while they drove.</p><p>He didn't even scream when he saw the headlights coming straight toward them and the truck swerving.</p><p>He ignored the pain in his chest and his head. He ignored the screams. He ignored the warm liquid slowly surrounding him. He ignored the sirens of the ambulance and the doctors begging him to stay awake.</p><p>But Charles, "Crutchie", Morris couldn't ignore the beep...beep...beep BEEP! of the heart monitor. He knew that sound. It ran over and over in his head since two months ago when Jack, his brother had died. When Davey had left. When Race lost hope. And when Crutchie couldn't hold it together.</p><p>Jack was dead, and Race gad just gone to join him.</p><p>Crutchie screamed the most agonising scream and grabbed Racetrack's hand, begging his heart to beat.</p><p>"C'mon Antonio," he pleaded. He was probably breaking Race's hand from his grip. It wouldn't matter as long as he was alive. He couldn't lose him, his brother was all he had left.</p><p>"Antonio Higgins you wake up right now," he ordered through a sob. It was then that the nurses came rushing in like they did for Jack.</p><p>And Crutchie couldn't say that the last time he saw Race alive was in that hospital room. It was in Jack's- when Jack Kelly's heart was still beating. And when you think about it, Crutchie and Davey had died that day too.</p>
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